The Year of the Flood: Difference between revisions
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Toby is a young woman who loses her family, blaming the corporations, and is forced to work in a low-quality burger joint. She soon encounters the unwelcome attention of the brutish manager of the chain who is depicted as grooming and assaulting women in his employ. Adam One, depicted as a self-proclaimed [[messiah]] but perceived by outsiders as a [[cult]] leader, saves Toby from the manager and takes her to the sanctuary of his rooftop garden. Toby becomes an influential member of the gardeners and encounters Ren, a child member of the gardeners. |
Toby is a young woman who loses her family, blaming the corporations, and is forced to work in a low-quality burger joint. She soon encounters the unwelcome attention of the brutish manager of the chain who is depicted as grooming and assaulting women in his employ. Adam One, depicted as a self-proclaimed [[messiah]] but perceived by outsiders as a [[cult]] leader, saves Toby from the manager and takes her to the sanctuary of his rooftop garden. Toby becomes an influential member of the gardeners and encounters Ren, a child member of the gardeners. |
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Ren eventually grows up to become a trapeze dancer in the sex club Scales and Tails and |
Ren eventually grows up to become a trapeze dancer in the sex club Scales and Tails, and happens to be locked in a bio-containment unit in the club when the pandemic occurs. Similarly, Toby is barricaded within a luxury spa where she has begun to work following the gardeners raid. |
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==Main characters== |
==Main characters== |
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* '''Ren''', a trapeze dancer who works at the sex club Scales and Tails, who survives the plague by being isolated in the club's biohazard containment chamber. She previously dated Jimmy (Snowman) in school. |
* '''Ren''', a trapeze dancer who works at the sex club Scales and Tails, who survives the plague by being isolated in the club's biohazard containment chamber. She previously dated Jimmy (Snowman) in school. |
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Revision as of 19:13, 8 October 2013
 First edition cover (UK) | |
| Author | Margaret Atwood |
|---|---|
| Language | English |
| Genre | Speculative fiction, Novel |
| Publisher | Bloomsbury Publishing (UK) |
Publication date | September 2009 (first edition, hardcover) |
| Publication place | Canada |
| Pages | 448 pp (first edition, hardcover) |
| ISBN | ISBN 978-0-7475-8516-9 (first edition, hardcover) Parameter error in {{ISBNT}}: invalid character |
| OCLC | 373481031 |
| Preceded by | Oryx and Crake |
| Followed by | MaddAddam |
The Year of the Flood is a novel by Canadian author Margaret Atwood, released on September 22, 2009 in Canada and the United States, and on September 7, 2009, in the United Kingdom.[1] The novel was mentioned in numerous newspaper review articles looking forward to notable fiction of 2009.[2][3]
The book focuses on a group called God's Gardeners, a small community of survivors of the same biological catastrophe depicted in Atwood's earlier novel Oryx and Crake. The earlier novel contained several brief references to the group.
It answers some of the questions of Oryx and Crake and reveals the identity of the three real human figures who appear at the end of the earlier book and sets the scene for the final book of the trilogy, MaddAddam. [4]
Plot
The Year of the Flood details the events of Oryx and Crake from the perspective of the lower classes in the pleeblands, specifically the God's Gardeners. God's Gardeners are devoted to preserving all plant and animal life, and they predict a disaster (The Flood according to the Gardeners, known by the readers to be Crake's viral pandemic) will radically alter the Earth.
The plot follows two characters, Toby and Ren, whose stories intertwine with each other and, at points, with major characters from Oryx and Crake. Much of the story is told through flashback with the two main characters separately surviving the apocalypse described in the previous novel, both reminiscing about their time in the God's Gardeners religious movements and the events that led to their current positions.
Toby is a young woman who loses her family, blaming the corporations, and is forced to work in a low-quality burger joint. She soon encounters the unwelcome attention of the brutish manager of the chain who is depicted as grooming and assaulting women in his employ. Adam One, depicted as a self-proclaimed messiah but perceived by outsiders as a cult leader, saves Toby from the manager and takes her to the sanctuary of his rooftop garden. Toby becomes an influential member of the gardeners and encounters Ren, a child member of the gardeners.
Ren eventually grows up to become a trapeze dancer in the sex club Scales and Tails, and happens to be locked in a bio-containment unit in the club when the pandemic occurs. Similarly, Toby is barricaded within a luxury spa where she has begun to work following the gardeners raid.
Main characters
- Ren, a trapeze dancer who works at the sex club Scales and Tails, who survives the plague by being isolated in the club's biohazard containment chamber. She previously dated Jimmy (Snowman) in school.
- Toby, a God's Gardener who goes into hiding to escape a dangerous stalker, by working in a high-end spa.
Oryx, Crake and Jimmy appear in cameo roles over the course of the book with the protagonists Ren and Toby unaware that these characters are eventually responsible for the pandemic. Notably, while the first book shows the world through the eyes of Jimmy and women are reduced to one-dimensional characters; here the women, Ren and Toby, are fully realised characters while Jimmy and Crake are only shown through the women's obfuscated perspective.[5]
Promotion
Atwood's tour to promote the book included choral performances of 14 religious hymns that appear in the book.[6]
Naming rights
For both Oryx and Crake and The Year of the Flood, Atwood donated naming rights to characters in the novel to charity auctions. One of the winning bidders was journalist Rebecca Eckler, who paid $7,000 at a benefit for the magazine The Walrus.[7]
Reception
The novel was generally well-received; reviewers noted that while the plot was sometimes chaotic,[8] the novel's imperfections meshed well with the flawed reality the book was trying to reflect.[9] The Daily Telegraph commented that "Margaret Atwood is genuinely inventive, rather than merely clever".[8]
In 2010, the novel was longlisted as a candidate for the 2011 International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award,[10] and shortlisted for the 2010 Trillium Book Award.
References
- ^ "The Year of the Flood by Margaret Atwood". FantasticFiction. Retrieved 2009-08-08.
- ^
Pellegrino, Nicky (2009-01-09). "Books to watch for in 2009". The New Zealand Herald. Retrieved 2009-08-08.
{{cite web}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in:|publisher=(help) - ^ Healy, Madeline. "Smorgasbord of titles awaits readers in 2009". The Courier-Mail. Queensland Newspapers. Retrieved 2009-08-08. [dead link]
- ^ "Heads Up: MaddAddam". The Independent. Retrieved 23 July 2013.
- ^ The Year of the Flood by Margaret Atwood. Guardian. Retrieved 23 July 2013
- ^ Heather Mallick, "Here comes the flood". cbc.ca, September 27, 2009.
- ^ Rebecca Eckler, "Margaret Atwood didn’t kill me". Maclean's, September 23, 2009.
- ^ a b Moore, Caroline (2009-09-10). "The Year of the Flood by Margaret Atwood: review". The Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 2010-12-06.
{{cite news}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in:|publisher=(help) - ^ Winterson, Jeanette (2009-09-17). "Strange New World". The New York Times. Retrieved 2010-12-06.
- ^ "A week of literary awards". Edmonton Journal. 2010-11-21. Retrieved 2010-12-06.
{{cite news}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in:|publisher=(help)
External links
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